i've read about the lcd being fragile...
but that's just the 2% of disgruntled owners being loud, while teh 98% of happy owners are out taking great pictures
Buyers Beware: the sd300 lcd breaks VERY EASY. Take special care when handling as even the slightest impact can break it, and canon WILL NOT replace it free of charge.
IMO, this is reason enough not to buy the camera. The simple fact that it can break from something as simple as being in your pocket is screaming flawed design.
You won't see this in any reviews because reviewers only test the product... they don't actually have extended experience with it.
Yet another flippin' awesome review, man! I can't even imagine buying a digital camera at this point without reading what you have to say about it. Thanks for all of the hard work, dude!
I just got this camera last week to compliment my Dimage A1 and I've very impressed. The movie quality rocks. The pictures aren't quite as clear as my Dimage, but that's where the $400 price different comes in. I paid just over $300 for this camera. I really wanted to wait for next month to get either ther sd500 or sd600, but since I'm headed on a cruise next week I couldn't wait any longer, though I may ebay this after the trip and get one of the new ones depending on their street price. I also found replacement batteries (generic) for $12 online and picked up a couple of those.
I did comparisons of this camera with the eLixims. Even though I could get the 5mp casio for the same price, it just didn't do as much as well as this camera. I also couldn't stand that they had to have that docking station to charge.
Okay, I think I've decided now. I'm buying the IXUS 40 (as it's apparently called here), along with a fast 1GB SD card and Canon's own camera bag. Should be really neat to have this camera the coming summer. :) I've read more reviews of it and they're all agreeing with this one!
#21 they did I believe add a digital zoom in the SD500 but not an optical one. Though since the image is so small compaired to the sensor resolution it will probably work well. The auto focus system is designed to continously focus.
I have a SD300 and I also use a Lexar 32x 1 GB on it. I've tried taken a movie sample with a full battery charge had it go till I filled the card to capacity. Thats about 8 minutes and 45(50 maybe) using a empty card @ 640x480 30 FPS. After that, I still managed to get a weeks worth of shots (about 10-20 a day) with a few more videos on the battery charge. Needless to say, I am impressed and decided to against buying a spare.
I am irked about the inability to zoom in the movie mode but I heard they fixed that in the upcoming SD500......
I'm of the opinion that the Casio EXILIM series are better cameras than these. I have the Z-55 and it's the speediest 5MP ultracompact I've come in contact with. I'd like to see Anandtech do a review of the Z-40, Z-50, Z-55, and the EX-S100 to see how they stack up.
I have an SD200 which is the same camera apart from the sensor, (3.2 instead of 4, save 100 dollars). Things to note about the SDX00 series (new 400, and 500 were introduced).
Firstly, there are more CAs then the average digital (purple fringing), quite alot of it looks to be blooming (ie leakage charging). The lens is definatly soft in the corners, this seems to be the most distrubing when you have something with random high detail, ie tree branches, but not so bad when you have uniform high detail, say grass.
These cameras are said not to have an aperture, instead, they are said to have a ND filter, to cut the light in half. There have been some comments that corner softness in lessed when the camera decides to shoot at a high "aperture" but I have not confired them. The camera itself does not display the shutter speed or aperture even in review mode so its difficult to do that test.
On the flipside I did notice corner softness decrease as focal length increased (probably because that really works like an aperture, it uses just the center of the lens at tele), so if you want a really sharp picture of something standback and zoom in. (I never thought I'd say that).
The video mode is good, but you'll need a fast SD card to do it at 640X480 30fps consistently. The one I have is borderline, and depends what I am taking it of, a little ! warns the buffer is getting full. However 320X240 modes always works for those really long videos at need, if your card ends up not being quite fast enough.
So it is clear I got this camera, so that I would always have a camera with me, I have SLRs for the good stuff, I new about most of the issues I mentioned before I got it, most of them can be worked around.
The highest prase I can give it is I didn't return it.
I have a Canon S300 (over 3 years old...) and I'm looking to replace it.
I really really like the S410, but once I saw the SD300 I was hooked, the DigiII chip speed rocks.
Well alomst hooked.... The point of a camera is to take pictures....good pictures in my opinion.
The SD300 does a good job, but the flare from flashes and the purple fringing are horrible. I've compared side-by-side shots of my S300 to the SD300. My old S300 takes MUCH better pictures despite 1/2 the resolution (and twice the weight and size!.....but if I wanted to enlarge a print...to lets say 8x10...the SD300 is better.
I guess the S410 is my best option for now.... I'll live with the puny LCD and useless video mode....it's a camera damnit, not a vide camera.
Anyhow.... maybe the SD310 will be better? (A guess)
#12, I agree with #14. Unless you really need the extra MP, I would go with the SD300 for its speed. If you really want a 5 MP ultra-compact, it might be worth waiting until the SD400 becomes available.
I considered the same two cameras before ultimately purchasing the SD300. The speed of the Digic II, the vastly superior movie mode, and the 2-in. LCD got me at the end. I personally do not edit pictures very much so the extra 1-MP isn't as important to me. 4 MP is enough for 8x10s which is the largest I will ever blow up a pic.
Stephen: I'm looking to buy a camera for my wedding this summer. I'm sure it'll be one of the canon elph's. The S500 is almost the same price as this SD300, which would you recommend? or just in general, which ultra-compact would you recommend?
I have this camera and it probably is the top digital camera in its size class. There are some downsides to having such a small camera especially with regard to the purple fringing, and some of the graininess in night shots (due to the tiny photosensor), but it has some crazy attributes that make an amazing camera. One is the unreal speed of this thing. It is ready to take pictures within a second of turning on and it takes pictures with almost no delay at all when already powered on. It also has unreal battery life. I tested it once at home by taking 50% flash shots continuously in rapid-fire mode and it took over 1700 shots before the battery died. These things make it almost flawless for its main purpose - to take a bunch of casual pictures when on vacation without worrying about the battery dying and to get the shot you want without losing it while the camera is still trying to focus/turn on/bring the lens out etc.
Does anyone know if there is a way to reduce the oversharping though? I'm not too happy about that. I know the Digital Rebel comes with sharpness set a little high by default but they allow you to reduce back to the EOS-10D/20D default levels.
The SD300 is an awesome camera, but some note should be made of the very obvious artifacting in the resolution tests. The Canon may display slightly higher resolution than the Nikon, but that comes at a cost: the oversharping causes extreme moire and artifacting issues in very fine detail.
Thank you for finally reviewing a top notch camera though!
AtaStrumf, thanks for the suggestion. Its always sort of tricky finding something suitable for video samples. Believe it or not, sometimes its really hard to find something interesting to shoot. I'll venture more into the downtown scene next time ;-)
Also a nice camera, but the small lens size makes *S*Purple fringing (check spelling in your conclusion) a real pain in the you-know-where (not neck ;-). It shows up big and often, although SD300 seems to be a bit better.
One complaint: a bad movie sample. Shoot something more interesting next time and not so far away and detailed (it really gets blurred-lost), because I don't think anybody will be making IMAX type of movies with it. Show a stroll along the beach, kids playing, fish, cats something close up, colorfull and moving.
Haven't read the review yet but I gotta say this right now anyway, because I just saw the pricetag on this IXUS and I already know it's not for me.
Just today I was thinking that next time you guys put up a review I gotta ask you to review a Canon PowerShot A510 and/or A520. It may seem just like a A75/A85 in a new form factor, which I suppose it is, but it also has a new lens and there is some confusion about wheather or not both A510 and A520 use the same CCD sensor, so I'd really like to see a review before I buy, but I just can't find any, which is really odd, considering it looks like just the right combination of features and price, which should make it extremely popular choice.
Please, please, please review this camera.
Sorry about the stupid long sentence, but I think it conveys very well exactly what I wanted to say.
Whew, that seems like the sort of camera I'll get if I fancy something better than my Minolta DiMAGE X20. Only downside I can see to the Canon is that it uses a proprietary battery rather than AA cells so I'd have to take the charger with me rather than simply taking a few sets of ready to use NiMH away with me, but I guess they couldn't have made the camera so small otherwise.
Given the Canon's impressive movie capature ability, is there a limit to what size SD card the camera accepts? Will it take 1GB and the recently introduced 2GB SD cards? 640x480 @ 30fps MJPEG will eat the megabytes up pretty quickly, if the 320x240 @ 15fps MJPEG my camera can do is anything to go by.
The SD300 is a great little camera. I bought one in December. It does have a couple of drawbacks though.
In photos taken in low light, the photos occasionaly come out with a bright white "swirl" in the image. It is the flash refecting off of dust apparently. It is mentioned on the Canon website in the FAQ for this camera. This has ruined more than one of my photos.
Also, as with many ultra-compacts, red-eye is a problem even with the red-eye reduction flash. There is just no avoiding it in some shots, but that is what Photoshop is for.
If you get this camera, make sure to get the Canon leather case designed for it. It is incredibly small, comes in red or black and looks good to boot.
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Fricardo - Saturday, July 16, 2005 - link
"We are eagerly awaiting the release of the 5 megapixel PowerShot SD400 and we will certainly bring you a review"Sooo, the SD400 is out. And still no review?
brownba - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
i love my sd300i've read about the lcd being fragile...
but that's just the 2% of disgruntled owners being loud, while teh 98% of happy owners are out taking great pictures
zoomsix - Wednesday, June 1, 2005 - link
Buyers Beware: the sd300 lcd breaks VERY EASY. Take special care when handling as even the slightest impact can break it, and canon WILL NOT replace it free of charge.IMO, this is reason enough not to buy the camera. The simple fact that it can break from something as simple as being in your pocket is screaming flawed design.
You won't see this in any reviews because reviewers only test the product... they don't actually have extended experience with it.
If you don't believe me, just search around.
You have been warned.
Cameraman - Wednesday, March 9, 2005 - link
Yet another flippin' awesome review, man! I can't even imagine buying a digital camera at this point without reading what you have to say about it. Thanks for all of the hard work, dude!Bookie - Monday, February 28, 2005 - link
I just got this camera last week to compliment my Dimage A1 and I've very impressed. The movie quality rocks. The pictures aren't quite as clear as my Dimage, but that's where the $400 price different comes in. I paid just over $300 for this camera. I really wanted to wait for next month to get either ther sd500 or sd600, but since I'm headed on a cruise next week I couldn't wait any longer, though I may ebay this after the trip and get one of the new ones depending on their street price. I also found replacement batteries (generic) for $12 online and picked up a couple of those.I did comparisons of this camera with the eLixims. Even though I could get the 5mp casio for the same price, it just didn't do as much as well as this camera. I also couldn't stand that they had to have that docking station to charge.
Brunnis - Saturday, February 26, 2005 - link
Okay, I think I've decided now. I'm buying the IXUS 40 (as it's apparently called here), along with a fast 1GB SD card and Canon's own camera bag. Should be really neat to have this camera the coming summer. :) I've read more reviews of it and they're all agreeing with this one!drwho9437 - Friday, February 25, 2005 - link
#21 they did I believe add a digital zoom in the SD500 but not an optical one. Though since the image is so small compaired to the sensor resolution it will probably work well. The auto focus system is designed to continously focus.stephencaston - Friday, February 25, 2005 - link
#22, yep IXUS 40 for the SD300 and IXUS 30 for the SD200.Brunnis - Friday, February 25, 2005 - link
This is pretty much what I've been looking for! I'm just wondering what the exact name is in europe. Would this be the Digital IXUS 40 (not 400!)?Jedi2155 - Friday, February 25, 2005 - link
I have a SD300 and I also use a Lexar 32x 1 GB on it. I've tried taken a movie sample with a full battery charge had it go till I filled the card to capacity. Thats about 8 minutes and 45(50 maybe) using a empty card @ 640x480 30 FPS. After that, I still managed to get a weeks worth of shots (about 10-20 a day) with a few more videos on the battery charge. Needless to say, I am impressed and decided to against buying a spare.I am irked about the inability to zoom in the movie mode but I heard they fixed that in the upcoming SD500......
ElFenix - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
your title is funnybest [class] camera in its class?
=)
nice review, otherwise. i really want a small camera for parties, etc. my S40 takes up too much space in my pocket, along with my cell phone.
TrueWisdom - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
I'm of the opinion that the Casio EXILIM series are better cameras than these. I have the Z-55 and it's the speediest 5MP ultracompact I've come in contact with. I'd like to see Anandtech do a review of the Z-40, Z-50, Z-55, and the EX-S100 to see how they stack up.drwho9437 - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
Quasi review:I have an SD200 which is the same camera apart from the sensor, (3.2 instead of 4, save 100 dollars). Things to note about the SDX00 series (new 400, and 500 were introduced).
Firstly, there are more CAs then the average digital (purple fringing), quite alot of it looks to be blooming (ie leakage charging). The lens is definatly soft in the corners, this seems to be the most distrubing when you have something with random high detail, ie tree branches, but not so bad when you have uniform high detail, say grass.
These cameras are said not to have an aperture, instead, they are said to have a ND filter, to cut the light in half. There have been some comments that corner softness in lessed when the camera decides to shoot at a high "aperture" but I have not confired them. The camera itself does not display the shutter speed or aperture even in review mode so its difficult to do that test.
On the flipside I did notice corner softness decrease as focal length increased (probably because that really works like an aperture, it uses just the center of the lens at tele), so if you want a really sharp picture of something standback and zoom in. (I never thought I'd say that).
The video mode is good, but you'll need a fast SD card to do it at 640X480 30fps consistently. The one I have is borderline, and depends what I am taking it of, a little ! warns the buffer is getting full. However 320X240 modes always works for those really long videos at need, if your card ends up not being quite fast enough.
So it is clear I got this camera, so that I would always have a camera with me, I have SLRs for the good stuff, I new about most of the issues I mentioned before I got it, most of them can be worked around.
The highest prase I can give it is I didn't return it.
Souka - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
I have a Canon S300 (over 3 years old...) and I'm looking to replace it.I really really like the S410, but once I saw the SD300 I was hooked, the DigiII chip speed rocks.
Well alomst hooked.... The point of a camera is to take pictures....good pictures in my opinion.
The SD300 does a good job, but the flare from flashes and the purple fringing are horrible. I've compared side-by-side shots of my S300 to the SD300. My old S300 takes MUCH better pictures despite 1/2 the resolution (and twice the weight and size!.....but if I wanted to enlarge a print...to lets say 8x10...the SD300 is better.
I guess the S410 is my best option for now.... I'll live with the puny LCD and useless video mode....it's a camera damnit, not a vide camera.
Anyhow.... maybe the SD310 will be better? (A guess)
Cheers....
stephencaston - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
#12, I agree with #14. Unless you really need the extra MP, I would go with the SD300 for its speed. If you really want a 5 MP ultra-compact, it might be worth waiting until the SD400 becomes available.R3MF - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
@ #6cheers, i didn't know that. :)
tyipengr - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
Sorry for the blank post earlier...#12-
I considered the same two cameras before ultimately purchasing the SD300. The speed of the Digic II, the vastly superior movie mode, and the 2-in. LCD got me at the end. I personally do not edit pictures very much so the extra 1-MP isn't as important to me. 4 MP is enough for 8x10s which is the largest I will ever blow up a pic.
tyipengr - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
brownba - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
Stephen: I'm looking to buy a camera for my wedding this summer. I'm sure it'll be one of the canon elph's. The S500 is almost the same price as this SD300, which would you recommend? or just in general, which ultra-compact would you recommend?sxr7171 - Thursday, February 24, 2005 - link
I have this camera and it probably is the top digital camera in its size class. There are some downsides to having such a small camera especially with regard to the purple fringing, and some of the graininess in night shots (due to the tiny photosensor), but it has some crazy attributes that make an amazing camera. One is the unreal speed of this thing. It is ready to take pictures within a second of turning on and it takes pictures with almost no delay at all when already powered on. It also has unreal battery life. I tested it once at home by taking 50% flash shots continuously in rapid-fire mode and it took over 1700 shots before the battery died. These things make it almost flawless for its main purpose - to take a bunch of casual pictures when on vacation without worrying about the battery dying and to get the shot you want without losing it while the camera is still trying to focus/turn on/bring the lens out etc.Does anyone know if there is a way to reduce the oversharping though? I'm not too happy about that. I know the Digital Rebel comes with sharpness set a little high by default but they allow you to reduce back to the EOS-10D/20D default levels.
hoppa - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
The SD300 is an awesome camera, but some note should be made of the very obvious artifacting in the resolution tests. The Canon may display slightly higher resolution than the Nikon, but that comes at a cost: the oversharping causes extreme moire and artifacting issues in very fine detail.Thank you for finally reviewing a top notch camera though!
IceWindius - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
Meh, no thanks, I love my new A85 just fine and dandy.stephencaston - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
AtaStrumf, thanks for the suggestion. Its always sort of tricky finding something suitable for video samples. Believe it or not, sometimes its really hard to find something interesting to shoot. I'll venture more into the downtown scene next time ;-)AtaStrumf - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
OK, read the review. Fabulous camera! A friend of mine has a Canon PS ELPH SD110 (3MP, 2x zoom)http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/Canon/canon_...
Also a nice camera, but the small lens size makes *S*Purple fringing (check spelling in your conclusion) a real pain in the you-know-where (not neck ;-). It shows up big and often, although SD300 seems to be a bit better.
One complaint: a bad movie sample. Shoot something more interesting next time and not so far away and detailed (it really gets blurred-lost), because I don't think anybody will be making IMAX type of movies with it. Show a stroll along the beach, kids playing, fish, cats something close up, colorfull and moving.
AtaStrumf - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
Oh yea, I forgot to stress that the new stuff (lens and CCD sensor) are _THE_ most important features that can single-handedly make or break a camera.And just for those who don't know it yet: IXUS=ELPH (EU/US).
And........, yep I think that's it.
AtaStrumf - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
Haven't read the review yet but I gotta say this right now anyway, because I just saw the pricetag on this IXUS and I already know it's not for me.Just today I was thinking that next time you guys put up a review I gotta ask you to review a Canon PowerShot A510 and/or A520. It may seem just like a A75/A85 in a new form factor, which I suppose it is, but it also has a new lens and there is some confusion about wheather or not both A510 and A520 use the same CCD sensor, so I'd really like to see a review before I buy, but I just can't find any, which is really odd, considering it looks like just the right combination of features and price, which should make it extremely popular choice.
Please, please, please review this camera.
Sorry about the stupid long sentence, but I think it conveys very well exactly what I wanted to say.
PrinceGaz - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
Whew, that seems like the sort of camera I'll get if I fancy something better than my Minolta DiMAGE X20. Only downside I can see to the Canon is that it uses a proprietary battery rather than AA cells so I'd have to take the charger with me rather than simply taking a few sets of ready to use NiMH away with me, but I guess they couldn't have made the camera so small otherwise.Given the Canon's impressive movie capature ability, is there a limit to what size SD card the camera accepts? Will it take 1GB and the recently introduced 2GB SD cards? 640x480 @ 30fps MJPEG will eat the megabytes up pretty quickly, if the 320x240 @ 15fps MJPEG my camera can do is anything to go by.
nels0360 - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
The SD300 is a great little camera. I bought one in December. It does have a couple of drawbacks though.In photos taken in low light, the photos occasionaly come out with a bright white "swirl" in the image. It is the flash refecting off of dust apparently. It is mentioned on the Canon website in the FAQ for this camera. This has ruined more than one of my photos.
Also, as with many ultra-compacts, red-eye is a problem even with the red-eye reduction flash. There is just no avoiding it in some shots, but that is what Photoshop is for.
If you get this camera, make sure to get the Canon leather case designed for it. It is incredibly small, comes in red or black and looks good to boot.
ksherman - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
dont ell me we are russian into the Soviet jokes again...Great review, and a gret product! I defenitly want one of these suckas!
Houdani - Wednesday, February 23, 2005 - link
In Soviet Russia, Canons power shoot YOU!